My Biggest FURNITURE RESTORATION yet Part of Its Literally Trashed Challenge

What do you want? Hi everyone. This is a pile of junk. This is for the literally trash challenge with a load of other great YouTubers and this piece is in a terrible state of repair. I got this from Facebook Marketplace. It's been used in a garage and obviously just used for storage in a garage and it's full of dings and scratches and paint and some of the worst hardware I've ever seen. So I'll go around it. I'll show you what I'm going to do with this and hopefully you enjoy the transformation. As always, thanks for watching. As the title to the challenge says, this literally is trash. I think a lot of people would probably just discard this and put it to landfill but for this challenge it's ideal. I want to see if I can bring it back to its former beauty and at this point I wasn't too sure but if you watch to the end you will be very very surprised at what was underneath all this damage and paint etc. The challenge is featuring quite a few of us, us restorers on YouTube and I know you guys like watching these challenges so stay tuned and you will see a beautiful transformation and I'll leave the link to the playlist for the other challenges in the description of the video. I'm going to remove the drawers but yeah, I don't really think you can call that a drawer at the minute. Let's remove this. Okay, this is very stylish. String, this is terrible. The inside doesn't look too bad actually. Well, obviously it doesn't look great but I need to go clean and the obligatory dead spider, spider's webs and there's some sort of mark in there. Not too sure what that is but I'll do a bit of research on that. This one shouldn't be too hard to take off. There you go. DMA, it's terrible. It's really worn and scratched in places but hopefully it might just be in the finish because these are veneered fronts so they won't take too much sanding out. So I'll just see what I can do. So let's take these off first. That's another easy one. Keep hold of that vintage piece. I've actually been looking for some sort of more period correct pulls online and I've managed to get some that I think will look really nice. They need restoring but they should look really nice when it's finished. So I'll show you them a bit later on in the video but these for now are going. A B&E's product, I don't know that manufacturer. I've not come across them before but I'll try and find something out and put it in the video. I'll try and save this somehow as well, this sticker. Put it back on somewhere. Once I've removed the bulk of the finish I just go in with some 4-0 steel wool and more stripper just to get rid of any of the little bits left over. If you can hear a strange noise in the background this is what it is. Hey duckies! They come right up to the back door to be fed. I'm not too sure why there's a piece of wire sticking through the side but that should be easy enough to take off. I can't wait to get this rubbish off this and see how it looks. Now everything's come off which I didn't expect it to. It's quite a thick finish this even though it's failed in part but it's quite a thick finish and obviously there's quite a lot of paint and stuff on it as well. Bits of drips of varnish and all sorts. I'll give this another go with the paint stripper, go over it again and we'll get it down to a position where we can have a look at the condition of the wood. You can feel it when you're scraping so that's where there's no finish on. It just glides and as you scrape you can feel it dragging. So do it smooth and then when you find something dragging go back and just add a little bit more pressure making sure you keep it flat. Don't tilt the thing like that because you'll, I know it sounds obvious, but you'll put the edge into the wood so you want to avoid that obviously. Okay carry on doing that now. Beautiful, well it will be when it's finished. You can neutralize this stripper with soapy water, you can also use some methylated spirit otherwise known as denatured alcohol. This is 4-0 wire wool, this isn't coarse wire wool. What do you want? It's cork. Yeah, he's so cheeky. There's one on the floor there. Go, go. I don't want you very vocal today. He's mad. Get your cork. Oh no, oh no, it's gone under there. Watch your paws. Have you got it? Good girl. Nutter. Good enough. Yeah. This drawer, the glues obviously give up or given up I should say. That needs repairing. Obviously this one needs completely rebuilding. Because the glue has totally failed on it. But it's no problem, I've got to do the others anyway. So yeah, we'll do that. This one has got this awful repair job previously done on it. Not too sure what that's hiding. And if I turn it over, somebody's had a go at doing something with that. I'm putting a big nail in it, not too sure. I think that's glue or silicone sealant, not too sure. So I'm going to tackle this. This has also got an issue with the veneer, but I'll tackle that later. This is still drying off, that's damp. I'll tackle that later. But what I want to do now is just take this drawer completely apart. Just to have a look what's going on there. I'm not too sure what that glue is, but it's solid. Not too sure what's going on here. Sorry, I forgot to press record again. What I've done is I've taken these sides off. That one was already missing. I've taken this side off, heated all this and managed to separate it from the base. And I don't know, this looks like silicone sealant, like bathroom sealant. Not too sure why. But I think this part should sit in like a rebate there. And it looks on first glance like that rebate is very, very shallow. So either that or something's come off the bottom there that should be on. So I'll have a look at that and clean it up first and then see what we need to do. Wow, this is going to take some time to clean this up. As my good friend Jay says, I'll be back in 2000 years later. Right, I've managed to clean up all that sealant off there. It took me quite a while. I know what's wrong with this now. I don't know how it's happened. But these bow fronts are generally plywood that's been bent around a form. And then they get veneered over the top. And plywood is thin strips of wood that's glued in between, pressed, laminated, left to dry. And for some reason, and it's happening there, this little bit has been delaminated. And it's obviously come off at some point. And you can see how it should look. It should be that thick. And then what happens is the drawer bottom then sits into that little channel. So for some reason, I don't know why, at some point in the past, that's come off. It's obviously come unglued and just come off. So I need to do a bit of work. There's a couple there, look. You can see it's delaminating a bit again. Same again on this end. So I just need to glue those up. And then what I'll have to do is cut some strips of wood the same thickness as that. Glue them together, clamp them, let them sit. And then I've got a channel back again. So I'll clean these up first and then I'll do that. This is the delamination look, you can see. So some there, it's happening there, there, there as well. So I need to put glue in all these bits and then I need to make another strip. Now when I was cleaning all this up, I had a look at the other drawer front. And as I was looking at it, that just popped off. So that is what's missing from there. So I need to make one of those. But I also need to clean this up, re-glue this. And make sure that there's no delamination anywhere else. But because there's two that this has happened to, there's five drawers in total. So what I'm going to have to do is check every single drawer and make sure these are sound. And they're not just going to fall off in a couple of months time, a couple of years time. I might as well take them off now, clean them up and re-glue them. So this is the thing with old pieces, you just never know until you start working on them what you're going to come across. So no big deal. I need to make one for that and check all the others and re-glue them if needed. So on to that. Wow, this needs a lot of glue. I just needed to make that strip that was missing that I mentioned earlier. And fortunately, because this piece fell off the other drawer, I use it as a template. Now the plywood that I'm using isn't thick enough and I didn't have any the same thickness of the one that was missing. So what I'm doing is I'm cutting two pieces the same size and I'll have to laminate those together. And then add it to the drawer. This is why you can never have too many clamps. And I definitely need some more because I'm having to do this in stages because I've just not got enough clamps. But this is what it is. Right, leave that to dry. So the piece I stuck together is all dried now. I just need to stick that on there to create that groove the drawer bottom will slide into. I mentioned earlier that I was going to check all the drawers to make sure the glue was sound. It wasn't. And all five drawers needed taking apart and re-gluing. I just need to put this drawer together. I'm going to sand all the drawer inside and out. All the sides, all the underneath and everything. These little glue blocks I've taken off because most of them were dried out. I've cleaned them up. They need to go back on. Then I need to glue everything together. So I'll clean it up first. Yeah, I put that on the wrong end. Oops, don't mind. I need glue on that end anyway. Once I've glued the drawer, I just want to make sure that it's all squared up before it dries. And to do that, I'm just using a set square and a tape measure just to make sure all the measurements are the same. What are you doing? You're so cheeky. Very, very cheeky. Oh, you're daft. You're daft. The repair I've done on this drawer front. It was slightly higher because I doubled it up. It was a slightly thicker piece. So thinking about it, when I shut the drawers, the drawers are going to shut against this. So I don't want this to be further forward than the other drawers because it'll push this drawer out more. So all I'm doing is I'm just smoothing it off. And to be honest, it looks better because it's getting rid of this very, very thin rubbishy top layer of hardwood and leaving a much nicer finish. All completely sanded inside and out. So I just need to, actually, I just need to do those corners. Because I used a circular sander. I just need to use my triangular sander just to get in those corners up. Once I've done that, all the fronts are at 240. Look at that grain, that grain. I'm so happy with that grain. It's going to look so nice when it's finished. I just need to do a repair on that. That's the bulk of the work on the drawers done. Just need to finish off the actual cabinet now. To clean the piece, I'm just using some warm water with a little bit of household bleaching. I don't normally use bleach. But this had a bit of a musty smell, probably due to some mildew. So I'm just trying to kill off that mildew with a little bit of bleach. Right, so this is the top. Everything's been stripped back. Just needs a bit of a sand. But I'll show you. This is the top. So we've got repair there. Little repair there. Another one there. Some more little repairs there. And another one. On the side, we've got these holes. That side. I thought we had some on this side. Oh yeah, on that side. And then at the bottom, some repairs needed there. Little veneer repair there. And then on the drawers, just one drawer that needs this repair, do we? Different methods. Some fill sticks. Some filler. Some veneer repairs. We'll get on with that now. Before I start the repairs, I just want to give it a quick sand over. With 240 grit sandpaper. I don't know whether you're going to be able to see this on camera. But there's quite a deep... Well, it's not really deep. But a deep-ish scratch going right across the grain there. Like I say, this veneer is quite thin. So what I want to try and do before I carry on sanding, is try and lift that a little bit if I can. There's the scratch. So let's put from about there. This is a damp cloth. I don't want to put too much heat on it. Because I don't want the veneer to come off. Right, just leave this to dry. Hopefully that's raised some of the grain. Filled in them cracks. So when I sand, it hopefully will sand out. I'm going to fill these with wood filler. Once they're dry, I can sand it. Have a look at it. Obviously, I think I'm going to stain it. The grain that's missing in these filled bits. I'm going to have to try and disguise that with some grain markers. And maybe some pigments. That's the next. That's a bit further down the line. You could also do this with wax filler sticks. But it's a bit more difficult to put some grain pattern in it then. No, don't want to do that. The trick to this. If you drill down. So if you drill that way. That's what happens. It starts lifting the veneer a bit. So it's all right. I can glue that and it won't be able to see it. But if you turn it the other way. Like you're unscrewing. It gives you a cleaner drill. So I could tip that. The reason I drilled the holes is just simply to make them a little bit bigger. And that's to accommodate these wooden dowels that I'm using to plug up the holes. So a little bit of wood glue. And then insert the dowels to plug up the holes. I just need to do this little veneer repair. And I keep a lot of old veneer from old furniture. So I'm just trying to find the best match from the offcuts that I've got. First thing to do when repairing this is to strain it up. Clean up the edge. So you've got a nice straight crisp edge for the veneer to go. Try and cut it at an angle. It just looks better on the grain. Then you make a little template with some tape. And then cut an appropriate piece of veneer to stick in. I forgot to hit record again. So basically what I've done is I've just cut that angle out of this piece of old veneer. It's nice and smooth that now. There's quite a lot of flakes of veneer coming off here. Obviously that's really thin. So not to do with this now. What I've decided to do with this chipped edge is to put a chamfer on it. Like a 45 degree chamfer. And obviously it's bringing through the backing. But the line is nice and straight. And once it's stained it may well look a different colour. But it'll just look like a border. So rather than loads of bits of cracks and flakes coming out. It should look a lot better. So that's what I'm doing. This is the only drop that's a bit of a mess. The veneer was so thin there it's just sort of flaked off. So I've blended that in. Once it's finished and stained and everything I'll see how it looks. And then I'll just touch that up and try and match the grain in. With this repair normally what you might do is try and put a piece of veneer in there. But to match this intricate grain is going to be an absolute nightmare with veneer. I just haven't got anything. And I'd never find anything anyway. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to fill that with some filler. And then once it's smoothed off, dry, stained. I'm going to have a look and see if I can mimic the grain pattern. Coming through it to try and disguise it. I just need to pick which stain colour I'm going to use now. Because I am staining the piece. It's a little bit orangey with a clear finish. And I want it to be a bit browner. More brown. I don't know if brown is a word. But more brown. So these are what I've got in stock at the moment. It'll look similar to this. It's not necessarily going to look exactly the same as this. Just a guide. So I will make a decision. I've decided to go with walnut. It's one of my favourite colours this. So I'll just stick to my favourites. I don't know whether you can hear that. This is UK weather. It's currently middle of April. And it's hail stoning outside. And 10 minutes ago the sun was shining. For the poor ducks. Obviously there's some patches that are going to need some additional work. So get the stain on first and see where we're at. This is the drawer that I did the repair on. That I think needs some colour matching. Where I put the filler in. But that's the filler. Can you see? I mean obviously you can see it. But it's come out much better than I thought. Once it's all dried. So what I'm going to do. I'll put a coat of lacquer. Just one over this. And see what it looks like when it's sort of wet. The final finish. And see what that looks like. I'll obviously have to do some sort of graining. But let's just see how it looks. And then we'll take it from there. This is the repair. After the first coat of lacquer. There. And obviously you can still see it. But it's almost insignificant. So I could go at this with different pigments. And try and colour match it totally. But I'm not confident that I could get a better job than this. So I might just leave that. Sometimes you've just got to say. Right well that's good enough. And will what I do next make it any better. And I don't think it will. So I think I'm going to leave that. I'll just do a little bit of touch up. But yeah. Happy with that. This edge is a little bit light. So I'm just going to use some of these little grain markers. This is just a bit light around there. So I'm going to darken it up a bit. I've tried with the marker pens. And it's not very good. So I'm going to give these a try. I've not really used these. And these are natural earth pigments. In all different colours. And all you do is you just literally. A little bit of polish. More meths. Methylated spirit or denatured alcohol. And you take a little. And you just mix. So you do that. Until you get a colour. You think matches a little bit. Now that's where the. That's where the skill comes in. And that's where the experience comes in. So like I say. It's not something I've done a lot before. So I'm going to have a go at this. Off camera. And I'll show you when I've finished. Wish me luck. That's where I'm up to. So. Just need to let that dry off. And hopefully. It shouldn't be too bad. Once it's got the top coat on. So I'm going to try and restore this hardware. No I'm not really. Get rid of them. I managed. Source. Online. Some. Used. Vintage. Hardware. Which is. Period correct. For this piece. But obviously they still need restoring. So that's what I'm going to do now. I'm going to restore them. There you go. So that's before obviously. And that's after. So I've still kept their age. But a lot nicer. We are coming to the end of the restoration. And the end of the video. So if you like what you've seen so far. Please give it a thumbs up. It really helps. And if you're not already. Please consider subscribing. I'd like to say a massive thank you. To everybody that supports the channel. Whether that's through the buy me a coffee app. Through the Amazon wishlist. Or through the super thanks button. I really do appreciate it. And if you'd like to support the channel. I'll leave all the links in the description. And don't forget. This is part of the literally trash challenge. So I will leave a link to the playlist. In the description. And I'll also leave a link on the end screen. So head over to those. And I hope you enjoy them. I'm sure you will. And as always. Thanks for watching.